Oscar Piastri assesses first drive in 2026 McLaren as he voices excitement for new season

Oscar Piastri has shared his first impressions after getting his debut running in McLaren’s new car at the Barcelona Shakedown, with the Australian admitting that he is “excited” to take the lessons he learned during last season forward into 2026.

Following the squad’s first day of their programme on Wednesday with Lando Norris at the wheel, Piastri hit the track at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya during Thursday as he clocked up his maiden laps in the MCL40.

Reflecting on how it had felt following his run, Piastri explained: “It was nice to be back out, and especially in a new car. A lot of new challenges for us this year up and down the grid, so it’s nice to get stuck into some of them.

“Unfortunately a few issues today. We had a fuel systems issue, which cut our day a bit short, but I know the team’s working really hard to get that fixed and get us back out for as many laps as we can tomorrow.”

Sharing further details on how McLaren’s programme had been going up until that point, the 24-year-old said: “Definitely the first few things are just trying to iron out all these bugs, find the problems. They’re all completely different cars, completely different engines to what we’ve had for the last three or four years, so that’s part of what this test is about.

“I think we’ve already identified a few things we can try and improve on the car to make it feel a bit nicer. They’re all going to be different to what we’ve had so, yeah, just trying to find all the bugs, all the problems, and then try and make the car faster.”

Piastri admitted that the process so far – amid the introduction of new regulations for 2026 – has been “a challenge and exciting”, adding: “There’s a lot of areas where you can be a point of difference and make a point of difference, which is exciting and we’ve got to put in the hard work to make that happen.

“But yeah, like I’ve said, there’s a lot of challenges for all of us up and down the grid. There’s going to be some aspects of these cars that we’ve never really had to do before in our careers, so there’s plenty of lessons to be learned.”

Ahead of returning to action on Friday, Piastri stated that the goal for the remainder of the shakedown would be “just trying to get a better feel for what the car is like”.

“There’s such a big departure from what we’ve had the last few years and all of my time in F1 that there’s a lot of things to understand,” he continued.

“There’s new engines to understand, but just the philosophy of the car is completely different as well and less downforce, so just getting used to that and how different things feel, trying to get a good read on that and, as quickly as possible, find a good direction to make the car quicker and feel nicer. That’s always the aim.”

Following the Barcelona Shakedown, the teams and drivers will head to Bahrain for two pre-season tests – taking place across February 11-13 and February 18-20 respectively – before the first race of the campaign, the Australian Grand Prix, kicks off the action on March 6-8.

Pushed on how he is feeling about entering a new era of Formula 1, Piastri responded: “I’m excited. I’ve had a good first three years in F1 and this is my first regulation reset, so it’s going to be interesting to see where we come out as a team.

“But I feel like last year I really proved to myself the things that I’m capable of, definitely still the things I need to improve and work on as well, but I feel like I really took a good step forward and those lessons I can take forward into whatever rules we get, so I’m excited.”